The Hen Report: “That’s Not How The Law Works” | Legal Battles for Animal Rights

We have kind of a special, a special deal today 'cause a lot has been going on with Direct Action Everywhere, and I'm sure most of you already know that and we've kind of touched on it. But um, and of course there has been the absolutely outrageous conviction of Zoe Rosenberg, a true heroin to almost all of us.

And there's this important news about the Ridglan Dog case and there's the upcoming appeal in Wayne Hsiung's appeal. And I tried to mention it a little bit, but you know, I don't know that much about it. So today we are lucky enough to have a wingman with us, uh, to, uh, clarify things for us.

And that's Steffen Seitz, and he is a recent graduate, well not that reason anymore, but pretty recent graduate of Yale Law School and a fellow with the Animal Activist Legal Defense Project at the University of Denver. He has been intimately involved with all of these cases. He promises he will not use a lot of legalese in talking about them, but I thought it would be great to have him here to kind of try to clarify things for us about what the hell is going on.

Jasmin Singer: Thanks so much for joining us.

Steffen Seitz: Thanks so much for having me.

Mariann Sullivan: It is a pleasure to welcome you.

Jasmin Singer: I like that Mariann just called you super old. She was like recent, but not that recent. Uh.

Mariann Sullivan: Well, I, I realize what, what was It 2023 you graduated?

Steffen Seitz: Was 2023. I did have a client recently say that I looked 20 years old, um, which is tough when you're walking into court and you're trying to appear a little bit more adult.

Mariann Sullivan: Oh, yeah. That's annoying.

Jasmin Singer: Yeah. Yeah.

We have, we have a friend who's a doctor and is like just super esteemed and like talented and looks like he's about 13 and I think he goes through the same, same thing. Okay. But before we get to our chat with you, just a really quick reminder that the Our Hen House podcasts are now divided up into, uh, like a, like a tasting menu, I guess you could call it.

Rising Anxieties comes out on Tuesdays, The Hen Report, which is this, comes out on Thursdays, and the long form interview comes out on Fridays. If you're in the flock, thank you. Bonus for Flock members comes out on Mondays. We're also a podcast and we're here on YouTube. For those of you who are watching on YouTube, thank you. Please subscribe and hit like wherever you listen or watch.

So Steffan, let's, let's get into our chat with you 'cause I know that's what people are tuning into today. I wanna start with Zoe. Uh, so for those who may not be familiar, which you know, I think most people probably are, but just, just in case, let's get a little background. So can you start by telling us what she was charged with and why?

Steffen Seitz: She was charged with three misdemeanors and one felony. Um, and this is for an investigation into, um, a number of factory farms and the Petaluma Poultry slaughterhouse in Sonoma County. Um, and in particular the, the misdemeanors, there are two trespass misdemeanors and the one tampering with a vehicle and the felony is actually felony conspiracy to commit misdemeanor trespass, which itself is a very unusual charge.

And all of this stems from an investigation into this Petaluma Poultry slaughterhouse and an open rescue where she removed a number of, of sick chickens from that slaughterhouse.

Mariann Sullivan: And tell us a little bit about, uh, the, the trial has been going on for a while, and I wanna get a little bit into what happened. But first, let's start with the ending. Can you just tell us how long the trial went? and what was the denu mon? So we get it outta the way.

Steffen Seitz: It was a seven week trial, an unusually long trial, um, and ultimately resulted in Zoe being convicted of all four counts.

Mariann Sullivan: And, and when is she gonna be sentenced?

Steffen Seitz: She'll be sentenced on December 3rd.

Mariann Sullivan: And, and what's the possible sentence?

Steffen Seitz: So her maximum exposure is about four and a half years. If she gets the maximum, all of the counts they run consecutively.

Jasmin Singer: So what has been the the press turnout? Like what kind of press has been covering this?

Steffen Seitz: The press now's actually been very positive. Um, and I think it's because people around the country, uh, recognize that this seems extremely unjust. Um, not only that she was prosecuted, but that she faces actual jail time for doing an act of compassion. Um, so there's been press in the New York Times. Um, CNN uh, had a brief segment on it.

Um, certainly, uh, you know, Vox and a number of the other publications that followed animal rights movement more closely have also written about it. So it's been a lot of press, um, and overwhelmingly very positive press where I think even people who are not part of the movement understand just how unjust and upside down all of this is.

Mariann Sullivan: What was the trial like? What wa was the judge particular, I mean, in some of these cases, the, the court has been, eh, not terrible, and others, there's just a viciousness. Uh, that what, where did this one fall? Was there a lot of hostility in the courtroom?

Steffen Seitz: Well, first and foremost, the trial was long. Um, you know, seven weeks is so long for, uh, what are ultimately actually fairly minor charges, all things considered. Um, and part of that is that just there was a lot of off days. There was a lot of days where they were arguing, um, evidentiary issues where the jury wasn't even in the courtroom.

So there's actually not even that much trial time 'cause there's so much arguments around that. And my sense from the judge is that this judge was sort of somewhere in the middle. Um, so it wasn't overtly hostile the way some judges have been, but also made some contradictory rulings, excluded a lot of evidence, um, and made some wrong evidentiary rulings that we'll certainly be taking up on appeal.

Mariann Sullivan: Yeah, that's the next question I wanna know, and I'd really like to dig into that a little bit though a long time from now, I'm sure we'll do a deep dive interview, be because it takes a long time for an appeal to be heard. But, uh, but... so this is very early days and, and you're still digesting it, but can you tell us your opinions on on likely arguments on appeal.

Steffen Seitz: So we'll have to obviously dig into the record and that's just gonna take so long 'cause it's gonne be such a long record given how long the trial was. But there's a few things we already know for sure we're gonna appeal. So first and foremost is the denial of the necessity defense. And the necessity defense is a legal defense that basically says you're allowed to violate the letter of the law to avoid some greater evil.

Um, we're all familiar with, you know, a dog in a hot car. Um, ordinarily I can't go around smashing windows. Um, but I can, if there's an animal suffering in that car and I have to intervene. I mean, our argument is that that's essentially what Zoe was doing.

Um, and yet it was denied by the court. The court said it doesn't apply to animals. It doesn't matter what kind of harm animals are suffering, the necessity of defense does not apply as a matter of law.

And so that's something we'll, we'll certainly contest on appeal. We think that that's wrong, the he got the law wrong there.

Um, it's also the case that one of the arguments, um, for the necessity defense was that this slaughterhouse was a threat to public health. They had unusually high rates of salmonella and other diseases. Um, these were well-documented. Zoe was very much aware of this when she intervened, she had reported it to relevant authorities who did nothing. Um, and so even if the necessity defense doesn't apply to animals, it certainly applies to humans. And yet the public health angle was entirely ignored by the court. So that's definitely one of the arguments we'll make.

Mariann Sullivan: Just to be clear, like you asked the court, you had to ask the court first, are we allowed to bring this defense and offer evidence to, to prove that, that this was necessary under this defense? And the court said, no, you're not, you, you're not gonna be allowed to, to argue this to the, to the, um, jury, and I'm not gonna charge it to the jury.

It's outta the case. That's how that happened?

Steffen Seitz: Exactly. We essentially did two things. We made a bunch of legal arguments as to why this defense should be available, um, under the law. Uh, and then we also made factual arguments, where we said, look, here's a bunch of evidence that we have. Here's what we think we'd be able to put on. Here's witnesses, here's what they would say.

Um, and then the court considered all of that, and there was a lot of back and forth. There was many hearings and motions on this, and ultimately the court excluded all of it.

Mariann Sullivan: Wow, it's just so disturbing. I mean, as, as you, well, maybe you don't know, but the necessity defense is just one, you know, it's a, it's a real cause for me, and it's just so insane to say that it doesn't apply to animals. It's just completely arbitrary. Why wouldn't it apply to animals? I mean, you can, you can harm animals.

It is frequently illegal to harm animals. Like if they wanna put that limit on it, it's only if, if, if what's being done to animals would be illegal. But of course they don't wanna put that on it 'cause they don't wanna have to decide whether what, what this slaughterhouse is doing to chickens is illegal under the cruelty law.

It's just the, the most, uh, to me, the most cynical way to get out of charging this. To just say, oh, well it doesn't apply to animals because like, it doesn't. Was that pretty much the, the rationale? It doesn't because it doesn't.

Steffen Seitz: Exactly. Um, and I I find it just as disturbing and cynical as you do. Um, in California, the exact language of the necessity defense is that it applies whenever there's a quote, significant evil. Um, and it's very clear that the law considers harm to animals significant evil. It's a felony to, um, mutilate animals and to hurt them.

Um, we've criminalized it. There's case law saying it's the public policy of California to avoid cruelty to animals and unnecessary suffering of animals. So I think it's very clear that it's a significant evil and the law should apply. And I think you're right that what's going on is that, um, judges and lawyers get the sense that if necessity defense applied to animals, maybe that would begin to peel back some of the inconsistencies and contradictions within the law.

The way that we have some laws that protect animals, but then we have an industrial animal agriculture industry that, um, as a, you know, matter of course continues to, to cause suffering to them. So I think it's that, that's surely what's going on. And, and the court's reasoning at the end of the day was basically, well, there's never been a case that has applied it to necessity, so I'm not going to do that here.

Um, even though that's, again, it's not, it's not exactly the

Mariann Sullivan: That's not how the law works. Just 'cause, just 'cause we've never done it before. It hasn't come up before, so we're never gonna do it. That's, it's just, uh, it drives me, it drives me crazy. But I think, you know, I think you're right. I think, and one of the reasons it, it's so problematic is it proves too much.

It just like, if. It opens floodgates. It really does because we're doing so much to animals. It is both unnecessary and viciously cruel. Alright, I'll

Jasmin Singer: Well,

Mariann Sullivan: on

Jasmin Singer: I just, I have what? I have a question.

Mariann Sullivan: Dig out. Yeah, please. Jasmin

Jasmin Singer: No, I listen as the non-lawyer in the room...

Mariann Sullivan: That's what I what I mean.

Jasmin Singer: Yeah. How, how is, how is, how's Zoe doing? Do you know?

Mariann Sullivan: You know, as the lawyer in the room, I just wanna say I care about how Zoe's doing too. Uh, we're all worried.

Steffen Seitz: Yeah, my sense is that Zoe is certainly extremely disappointed and frustrated with the outcome. Um, but also I, you know, she knew that this was, uh, a very likely possibility, um, and I think she's ready for it. I think she's, um, been using it to get as much attention to the plight of animals and to this sort of upside down legal regime that we have.

So I've been very impressed with the way that immediately after her conviction, she again tried to report animal cruelty to the district attorney. Um, and she again, immediately continued, uh, you know, fighting the good fight. So I think she's disappointed. Um, it's certainly a setback in some ways, but I think she's using the setback every way she can, and I've, I've been extremely impressed.

So I, I have not seen, uh, any sense that she's, um, sort of giving up or, or slowing down.

Mariann Sullivan: Yeah, she's a very impressive person. All right. I wanna get to, or I, I, I don't want this to be a two hour interview. It's supposed to be a quick update, but before I get onto Ridglan, which is a completely insane story for people who are not familiar with it. Completely insane. But before we get to that. Uh, we covered the necessity defense.

Was there any other arguments that really stand out to you that are likely to go up on appeal?

Steffen Seitz: I think certainly one of them will also be just the exclusion of a lot of evidence, especially animal cruelty evidence that was directly relevant to Zoe's intent. Zoe went inside and did this investigation, made, did this open rescue, because she had seen horrible things, especially at the factory farms that directly feed Petaluma Poultry slaughterhouse.

So she'd gone inside these factory farms, she saw animals collapsed with open wounds, all of these horrible things. And she knew those are the animals that end up at the slaughterhouse, and yet we weren't able to bring in any of that footage, any of that evidence, um, of, of essentially rampant animal suffering at the, at the factory farms that supply the slaughterhouse.

Mariann Sullivan: Yeah, that seems like a, a, a repeating story that we see in all of these cases. They don't want people to see what's happening to the animals. All right. Unless you have any further questions, Jasmin, on Zoe. I think we should move on to Ridglan because as I said, this story is, is nuts. You were on the Animal Law Podcast years ago and you were just preparing to go to trial because, uh, Wayne and, and I think Paul Picklesimer, um, and, and another defendant were accused of very serious crimes. It was right before the trial was about to start and you know, which was annoying for me when they dropped the charges and my podcast became stupid. I'm only kidding. But can you just tell that story?

That's just the beginning of the story because there have been a lot of follow ups and uh, it is the most, turn the tables on the bad guy story you can imagine.

Steffen Seitz: Yeah, it's a, it's a very long story, uh, and, and a good one. So it begins all the way back in 2017 when a number of activists with Direct Action Everywhere do investigation and open rescue, um, at Ridglan Farms, which is located just outside Madison, Wisconsin. It's this giant beagle breeding facility that sells beagles to research facilities, um, pharma companies, universities, et cetera.

Um, and at any given time, they have upwards of 3000 beagles in these huge sheds. They're windowless. There's these tiny wire cages, um, and the dogs, many of them go psychotic from, from these conditions. And so, uh, these activists take footage, um, they show what's going on inside this place and they remove a, a, a few beagles and get them veterinary help.

They ultimately end up being charged criminally for this because there's a big expose. They bear their faces, they tell the story openly of what they did and the horrible plight of these dogs, and they're charged criminally. So we represented Paul Picklesimer, one of the three defendants in that criminal case.

And right on the eve of trial, about a week before trial is supposed to begin, um, the prosecution suddenly drops the charges. Um, and it seems pretty clear that it's because Ridglan was worried about the publicity that was coming for them. Um, and what's something that's almost never happened to me as a defense attorney is, uh, our clients actually objected to dropping the charges.

They said, no, we want to be prosecuted. We want to go forward with this. And that's because we want to use this as a platform to show what happened inside this place. We don't think we did anything wrong. We wanna have our day in court.

Mariann Sullivan: Yeah, that's like the whole goal of, of these, of it's Direct Action Everywhere's, theory of change is really to, to do what other people say is illegal. And you say it's legal because it's justified. And, um, then we go to trial and and let the courts decide. And, and also, I just wanna add too, it's not nothing to prepare for a trial like that.

A lot of work went into that when they dropped the charges a week before. Oh, my God. I mean, it wasn't to like justify all of the legal work you'd done. That wasn't the really annoying part. But, but, uh. but it certainly is nothing, is not nothing.

All Right. go on.

Because this, you've only barely begun the story.

Steffen Seitz: Right. And so, uh, as soon as those charges were dropped, it felt like, um, the wind was out of our sails a bit because there was gonna be this big convergence in Madison. There's gonna be all this attention on Ridglan, an opportunity to show the world what's happening in this horrible place.

And so, uh, now that we were deprived of that trial, we turned around and very quickly filed a petition for a special prosecutor. So basically our, our goal was to turn the tables on Ridglan. And so there's actually a provision in Wisconsin Law that allows you to ask a court to appoint a prosecutor to investigate and charge criminally, um, an entity when two conditions are met.

One, when the district attorney, the usual prosecuting authority, has failed or refused, uh, to prosecute. And two, when there's probable cause to believe a crime has occurred. And so basically we argued that there was mountains of evidence, uh, assembled by these activists who went inside. inspection reports from the government, and then also from a, uh, former employee, uh, who's a whistleblower, who we were in touch with, um, who shared some of the horrible things that he saw inside.

And basically our argument was these cages are so small that dogs are going psychotic, and that's a violation of Wisconsin animal cruelty law. Um, the wire caging routinely causes injuries, uh, especially these large lesions on the dog's paws. Um, and then most gruesome of all is that Ridglan, as a matter of course, was doing what are called cherry eye surgeries, um, where they essentially remove an infected eye gland in the dog's eyes, except they were doing it totally to any normal protocol. You're not supposed to remove this it's an important part of the dog's eye. Um, but instead of providing proper veterinary care, they would simply snip off that portion of the dog's eye without anesthesia, without blood control, without aftercare. There's hold the dog down, snip it off, and then put the bleeding dog back in their cage.

Um, and so we argued that that was not just animal cruelty, but actually felony animal cruelty 'cause it constituted a mutilation of these dogs.

Jasmin Singer: Wow.

Steffen Seitz: There was a lot of litigation where Ridglan tried to fight back. We went to the court of appeals for a little bit, then it

Mariann Sullivan: Yeah, this has been hanging, hanging around for a while and I also did an Animal Law Pod... was that the one you were on or was it the first one you were on?

Steffen Seitz: I think it was the second on about... about, the

Mariann Sullivan: Episode about the about this journey of trying to get this, uh, special prosecutor appointed.

Steffen Seitz: Yeah. At the time we felt optimistic, partially just because it, it was putting Ridglan on the defensive and it was keeping the pressure and the attention on them. Um, but we, at that point, I just, I still did not dare to hope that we would actually get a special prosecutor, um. Just because, you know, animal law is, it's an excellent field, but it's, it's, you know, wins are pretty rare. Um, and, and so it felt like this was definitely an uphill battle, but this just got stronger and stronger the further along it went. And so we had this evidentiary hearing, and not only did we have a former employee testify about what he himself witnessed, we had another former employee who'd worked there for five years, step up and say he was traumatized by what he'd seen and participated in, he wanted to testify.

So it just became stronger and stronger. We got more inspection reports, even as Ridglan was under the microscope, they were still continuing to, uh, you know, violate basic regulations and not provide dogs adequate care. And so we had a full day hearing, we put all this evidence on for a judge, and the judge ultimately ruled in our favor in January, um, and granted the special prosecutor,

Mariann Sullivan: And that's not the end of the story 'cause they didn't immediately bring a case.

Steffen Seitz: Exactly. So the next thing is said, then the special prosecutor's appointed in February of this year. Um, and begins investigating and my sense is basically does a lot of back and forth with Ridglan's attorneys requesting documents from them. Doesn't do much in the way of independent investigation.

There's no search warrants, there's nothing like that. Um, but it becomes quite clear that Ridglan has done, at a minimum, several hundred counts of felony, animal cruelty 'cause of these cherry eye mutilations. And so that's going on. I will also say the other thing that's going on during all of this is that the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection, which is a regulatory agency that oversees Ridglan, is also doing investigations and puts together basically several hundred violations of their regulatory code,

Mariann Sullivan: Oh.

Steffen Seitz: they then approach Ridglan with and say you violated these things.

Um, at the same time, the Veterinary Examining Board, which is essentially the Wisconsin Board that licenses veterinarians. they begin looking into the head veterinarian of Ridglan, who's in charge of all of these surgeries and the treatment of dogs. Um, they end up actually suspending his license after a lot of hearings and back and forth.

So suddenly he can't practice veterinary medicine anymore because he was essentially, you know, mistreating dogs as, as a matter of his business. Um, so all of these things are happening at the same time.

Mariann Sullivan: Yeah, and let's just make clear those things are happen at the same time because Direct Action Everywhere's activists like, did this. Like the, the government agencies would've just cont... it's so important to bring that attention because then once you do, then the government agencies, maybe they feel pressure, maybe they actually care.

Uh, it, it just, animal issues are just so under the, under the table in so many situations that when somebody shines a light on them, it, it can, it, it's not just what you guys are, were doing. It was what all these other, it, it, it brought it to the attention of these other, these other regulatory facilities.

Whether it's the veterinary or the um, state ag, like that, oh, maybe we should do something about this. Actually maybe, maybe we really should do something about this.

Steffen Seitz: Yeah. So just to, to, to finish the story, um, what ends up happening is the special Prosecutor, um, ends up striking a deal with Ridglan, um, where Ridglan actually will shut down its breeding operation, which is upwards of 2,500 dogs at any given point. Um, and that's been the focus of this entire campaign, has been focused on the breeding operation.

They're going to shut that down and they have until July 1st to shut that down. And so that's absolutely huge win. That's thousands of future dogs who won't be subjected to horrible suffering, um, and then sent out to do for gruesome experiments at, at pharma companies. So that's definitely a big win. Um, but it's only a half win.

There's also a loss, and the loss is that Ridglan is not required to surrender any of the dogs currently still in its breeding operation. They have until July 1st to sell all of those dogs off. And so that's our focus now. It's not over yet because our focus now is absolutely on getting those dogs out by any means that we can.

Um, we're looking at every legal avenue. Um, we're trying to pressure them any possible way. We're asking Ridglan to do the right thing. We're asking the city to intervene, um, in any way we can to get those dogs out, because I think that would be the only way for this to be a real win where the, the dogs currently there get out.

Um, and then, you know, this shuts down for the future. Um, the last thing I wanna say is I think the real heroes of this story, um, are really two entities. So first is absolutely the activists, um, with Direct Action Everywhere who went in and exposed what was going on inside Ridglan. I mean that jumpstarted, all of this.

Ridglan's been operating for about 60 years, um, doing the same horrible things. No one had really cared until they exposed what was happening, and they brought attention to it, and they did it by risking their own necks.

Mariann Sullivan: Yeah, I, I mean, let's not forget that, that just because it all worked out well doesn't mean that the risks weren't enormous. I mean, it could have ended up very easily just like Zoe's case, and they could have ended up convicted and possibly going prison. Easily could have.

Steffen Seitz: They were facing really significant jail time and, and they, um... unbelievable courage, uh, what they, what they did, uh, to expose what's going on in Ridglan. Um, and then the second entity would be the activists on the ground in Wisconsin who after this happened, they didn't know that they had this giant beagle breeding operation in their backyard.

And so they jumped into action and especially I think noteworthy is Dane for Dogs, which is a local organization. And these aren't lawyers. they're not even people that are like, you know, longtime activists, necessarily like some of the Direct Action Everywhere people. It's, it's people who saw what was happening, felt alarmed and organized and, um, their work is, is really what got us as far as we did.

I mean, they were the ones who filed the veterinary board complaint, the Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection complaints. They've been doing a lot of open records requests. Uh, they sent hundreds and hundreds of emails to every agency, and that's why we were able to show that the prosecutor had refused to prosecute.

I mean, they really kept the pressure up. Um, and they themselves end up being civilly sued by Ridglan. Um, and that suit is actually still pending. Um, and so they also, uh, I mean, it's a ridiculous suit and we, we feel optimistic it'll be dismissed, but again, they also are risking something in all of this.

Um, but just extreme persistence and courage from the activists on the ground.

Mariann Sullivan: Oh, I love to hear that.

Jasmin Singer: Marianne and I live near Marshall Farms. I think that they're the only ones left breeding dogs for research. Right? Is that, is that right? Are there any plans?

Steffen Seitz: Yeah, so basically there used to be three large breeders for dogs, uh, for research. It was Envigo, which was shut down in 2022, Ridglan, which is now shutting down next year. And then the biggest of them all is Marshall, which has about 18,000 dogs in any given time. So they're, they're really massive. Uh, the good thing is there's just one left, the writing's hopefully on the wall.

Um, I think there's a lot of momentum for activists to turn their attention to, to Marshall after this. Um, and the supply chain is obviously getting much thinner, so I think there might be some smaller breeders, but really it's been these three big ones that have s ustained, uh, this horrific industry.

Mariann Sullivan: Yeah. And, and I, I mean, I don't wanna go too far down this road, but the fact is, is that research is changing. And one of the things that keeps research from changing and keeps it stuck in the animal model is all the money that's in, in these dogs and other animal... and you know, of course the dogs are just the tip of the iceberg.

Uh, there's many other animals involved. Those, you know, money talks and those people have power and now they have less power than they did. 'cause there's not as many people making money off of these dogs. And there's so many new methods of research. I mean, more I, I think that also will be a beneficial result of this.

Steffen Seitz: Absolutely. Um, and yeah, I've gotten to speak to some really amazing scientists who are doing incredible work, trying to move us away from, from animal models. Because of, of all this work. And uh, yeah. I mean one of the things I've learned is it seems like part of the reason we still use research on animals so much is just it's the way things have always been done.

If that's

Mariann Sullivan: Exactly. Exactly.

Steffen Seitz: the professor who taught you did that, and then that's what you teach to your students and it just keeps happening that way. Um, and just being able to sort of throw a wrench in that system, um, I think makes a huge difference because, I mean, some of the scientists told me I didn't wanna use animal models.

I had excellent research. And then a review would come back and be like, well, can you just verify all of this in an animal model? And they're like, why? I already have the results. I know that this works. I don't need to do these things, but it's just the way that things are done. And so hopefully this is part of a broader process of getting away from that.

Jasmin Singer: Hmm.

Mariann Sullivan: Alright finally... Uh, unless there's anything to add on Ridglan and then there's still a story to be told there, and there's still some dogs to get out, hopefully. But unless there's anything else specifically let's talk about Wayne. Steffen has agreed to do a deep dive interview on this case with me if the papers are ever finally filed, because I've been waiting for these papers to all be filed. There's a lot of papers around involved in this case. Um, but can you remind people, uh, this was the last Sonoma County case, I guess, and what he was convicted of? And then get us up to speed on what you expect to, well, you, you, you already, you've already filed your brief so you pretty know what's gonna be brought up on appeal.

Steffen Seitz: Correct. So Wayne Hsiung was convicted, um, of felony conspiracy commit misdemeanor trespass, and then two misdemeanor trespasses for two mass open rescue demonstrations where he led, um, hundreds of activists onto one factory farm, exposed what's happening there. They rescued a number of animals, um, and there was a lot of evidence of animal cruelty at that factory farm.

Um, and then at the other one, he wasn't even the leader, he just showed up and gave speeches while other people locked down. Um, and then he was held liable, not because he personally trespassed, but because his encouraging remarks, um, under the prosecution's theory, essentially encouraged other people to trespass.

And so he was convicted. This is back in 2023, the fall of 2023, so it's been a long time. Uh, we then filed an appeal, uh, which meant we had to go through this long record. It took a long time just to get the record, to get all of the things that had happened at trial, to go through that. And we filed a brief.

The government has since responded. We also filed a bunch of amicus briefs, so we've had amazing support. And essentially amicus briefs are when other parties, uh, who aren't actually, uh, the defendant in the case weigh in on a case because it matters, um, and because they're concerned about the direction of the law is going.

And so we had the Climate Defense Project, for example, weigh in 'cause they're concerned about the implications for climate activists. We had animal law professors, we had, um, Harvard's Animal Law Clinic. They all weighed in, um, about the treatment of animals. We had international support. So we had a German animal law professor weigh in because they've had similar cases there.

We had, uh, Animal Justice in Canada also write an amicus brief. So, and we had, uh, mainstream organizations like the National Lawyers Guild and the ACLU also write a brief. So it's been really a broad base of support because I think not only is this, um, a threat to animal activists and to the status of animals under the law, um, but also to protest more generally.

Jasmin Singer: Hmm. So is there anything else on the horizon in addition to these cases?

Steffen Seitz: So, uh, in, in, in terms of, uh, like other cases that we're working on or, or in terms of next s teps for these cases? Yeah. In terms of other cases we're working on, so we have a bunch of other, um, things on our, on our docket. A a lot of sort of smaller kind of ordinary protest cases. So maybe ones that won't be in the news so much, but you know, just individuals who are doing, say anti foie gras protests and then get, uh, charged with disorderly conduct and those kinds of petty things. And so that, right now in some ways is the bulk of our cases, is really, uh, trying to defend the right to protest for animal activists and these sort of everyday things where people aren't trying to get arrested or make a big statement, but are trying to keep the pressure up, uh, for animals.

Um, so yeah, we have, we have a lot of other cases like that. And then, uh, we have, we have some Open Records Act work. Um, we've got, uh, you know, some other activists that we're representing in, in sort of slightly more intense proceedings where they released some mink. Um, so there's, there's all sorts of, of, of cases that we have.

Um, but these are really the, the three that I think are sort of the most sort of press intensive.

Mariann Sullivan: I, you know, your, your clinic hasn't been around that long. I mean, it's just really a few years and the difference it has made in particularly the legal side of this movement, but in the movement generally of like, it used to be that people who, who did this kind of work and did this kind of activism, whether they were, whether they knew they were taking a risk or whether they just ended up in trouble for reasons they didn't anticipate, they had no way of obtaining a defense.

Um, like maybe out of pocket with somebody who had no, um, experience in animal law. Like, like it was a huge, huge gap in this movement. And, and you guys up there in Denver, really, really doing a great job filling that. So thank you and thank you for, for telling us all about it such clarity today.

Jasmin Singer: Before you go, speaking of Denver, any, uh, favorite places to hang out and eat vegan food?

Steffen Seitz: Yeah, so I'm a big fan of, of fellow traveler, which is, has good food, also great ambiance. Um, that's a place that I love to go here. And then Wellness Sushi, which is this vegan sushi place, uh, that I go to far too often. Um, it's really delicious.

Mariann Sullivan: How could you go too often to, well, it's, well, it's wellness. It's good for you.

Steffen Seitz: That's right. Um, you know, there's actually, yeah, it's a great vegan food scene here. Uh, so I've, I've loved living here. Um, and just on the, on the point about the clinic, I mean, I feel enormously lucky that I get to work with such courageous activists. Um, I agree with you, there's a huge need in the movement for, because I think there's, activism is really, my sense is it's been growing in recent years, and so there's absolutely a need for lawyers to be able to step in when, when activists inevitably clash with the forces that protect the status quo. Um, and I feel enormously lucky that I get to do that work and work with really incredible people who I think are, are, you know, the real heroes in all these stories. 'Cause they're the ones who are taking the risks. They're the ones who are doing the important work.

Um, and, and our goal is just to defend and empower them however we can.

Mariann Sullivan: Uh, it's, it, it's very exciting. I'm very excited about the work that you're doing, so thank you so much for everything you're doing. Uh, thank you for joining us today. This has really been helpful. I'm sure it's been helpful for people who know this stuff is going on, but, you know, sometimes it's hard to figure out exactly exactly what it is that's, that's, that's happening.

Before we go, I wanted to mention this. I just saw this a minute before we started recording. PBS Nature has a pigeon positive documentary coming out on November 5th, called The Pigeon Hustle. I just thought people would wanna know that and

Jasmin Singer: Uh, I think you,

Mariann Sullivan: I mean, we're kind of big fans of pigeons here at Our Hen House,

Jasmin Singer: You found out about it because I sent it to you. I just want to go on the record saying that I.

Mariann Sullivan: Yes, it was all Jasmin. Jasmin made the documentary.

Jasmin Singer: No, I didn't.

Mariann Sullivan: total

Jasmin Singer: But I, I have it queued up to watch today 'cause I am super excited about It I love a,

Mariann Sullivan: a, a,

Jasmin Singer: love a pigeons..

Mariann Sullivan: Secret 'cause we mention it all the time. But, um, Jasmin and I each have a pigeon, a fairly substantial pigeon tattoo and they were each drawn by Sue Coe.

Jasmin Singer: Mm-hmm.

Mariann Sullivan: not too many people can say that.

Jasmin Singer: Yeah. Be jealous. Be very jealous. Yeah, definitely check that out. And also, uh, thank you so much for those of you who are tuning in right now, don't forget to subscribe on your favorite pod catcher and on YouTube and make sure that you catch our next episode tomorrow. Mariann, is that about legislative attempts to limit factory farming?

Mariann Sullivan: Yes.

Jasmin Singer: Oh, good.

Mariann Sullivan: With folks from the Animal Animal Policy Alliance. And I just wanna mention too, like our last Animal Law Podcast, which came out last Friday, was about a very different but kind of related thing about, uh, about Will Lowrey and, and Animal Partisan trying to get a search warrant, um, of a chicken farm because they also, just like in the Wisconsin case, came up with some obscure statute that, that allowed private citizens to do something about, um, animal abuse. I mean, your, your statute in Wisconsin wasn't specifically about animal topics, I think, but, but there are these statutes out there that sometimes, sometimes allow us into court. Of course, uh, not always, but. But it's an exciting area, I think, to come up with these new arguments that, that apply to animals.

So that also, that one also, um, I, I, I highly recommend.

Alright, we also have to ask for money, um,

Jasmin Singer: Oh, right. Well, we are a nonprofit and this, this is our end of year fundraising push. Our big campaign where we raise the vast majority of the funds for the whole year. And so if you are interested and able to contribute at any level, go to ourhenhouse.org/support and every dollar that you donate this year will be matched twice.

So that means if you donate a dollar, we get three. So that's kind of awesome and we really appreciate it.

And we really appreciate you Steffen Seitz, not only 'cause you have a cool name, but because you have a cool brain and we're so glad that we had a chance to pick it today. So please come back. Don't be a stranger.

Steffen Seitz: Yeah. Thanks so much for having me.